


Gossip? In This Office? More Likely than You’d Think

by BabyGenius



Series: A Bat in A White Collar [3]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, White Collar
Genre: And surprise it isn’t from Diana, Attempt at Humor, Bets, Blink and you miss it gay implication, But that isn’t referenced in this really, But they aren’t actually, Fluff, Gen, Gossip, Humor, Is definitely a thing, Neal Caffrey is Dick Grayson, Neal and Jason being involved with the mob is tho, No beta we tpyo like men, People that aren’t curious?, Rumors, Whichever be your preference, Who do you take them for, Y’know I had to, an attempt at it, betting pools, or at least, or enbies, unfortunately, women
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-28
Updated: 2020-06-28
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:28:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24956854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BabyGenius/pseuds/BabyGenius
Summary: After the men had left and were no longer in ear range, everyone in the office exchanged looks. Agent Blake cleared his throat, “So are we gonna talk about that or…?”——Or: you can’t have Neal and his bro leave like that and then have no follow up. Of course there would be gossip and betting pools, these are people that make a living off of investigating for Pete’s sake. Just an interlude in my series, to be honest, but still a valid member of my series.
Series: A Bat in A White Collar [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1790395
Comments: 24
Kudos: 314





	Gossip? In This Office? More Likely than You’d Think

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, I’m gonna be real with y’all, coming up with bets and rumors that would be made was harder than I thought. I went into this going “of course I have ideas for rumors, I have ideas for All The Rumors”, but then the time came when I was staring at the Word document and I had to be real with myself. I had absolutely no clue what rumors or bets would be made. I think I made it work tho. Now, this is short, I’ll give ya that, but it’s an interlude for a reason so I hope you enjoy!  
> Also, this one has basically no Batman in it, aside from Jason Todd references, but if you clicked on this expecting a crossover, I didn’t really lie to you! My first two works in the series are crossovers so go read those!

After the men had left and were no longer in ear range, everyone in the office exchanged looks. Agent Blake cleared his throat, “So are we gonna talk about that or…?”

“I didn’t know he had a brother, let alone more than one,” Diana said, her eyebrows pinched together.

Peter shrugged, deciding to join in for a little bit before ruining the fun. “We never could find anything before he turned eighteen, so it’s not beyond the realm of possibilities that we wouldn’t have heard of them.”

Jones smirked. “I just find it funny that he’s the oldest, yet he gives you so many problems, Peter. He must know what it feels like to be on the receiving end.”

Peter glared at him. “Haha, laugh it up. Though, it’s true, I would have expected him to be the younger one. Maybe it’s because since he’s not on the receiving end he’s having fun with it?”

Agent Paterson shrugged and shook her head. “I could see it. I mean, I’d do it with my siblings, but I’m not the oldest sooo…”

Agent Blake’s face lit up with a devious smile. “Betting pool?” He asked, his eyes twinkling like a little kid on Christmas morn.

Peter shook his head. “I’m not authorizing this, or participating, but I know I can’t stop you.”

Everyone’s eyes turned to the direction of the stairs when they heard a door open. Hughes gave them all a long, searching look before joining them in the bullpen. “What exactly is going on here?”

Diana cleared her throat. “Neal’s brother came to visit. Neal thought said brother was dead. The brother claims to have been dead, but we don’t really believe him.” It’s somewhat odd that they don’t believe him, considering they live in a world where aliens have been proven to exist—and who knows what kind of tech they have access to—but there are certain places where one needs to draw the line, lest they go insane from the world no longer making sense the way it used to (it never really did, but they like to think it did at least a little).

Hughes’ eyebrows raised as he turned to Peter. “Caffrey has a brother?”

Peter nodded and shrugged helplessly. “I guess so. We think it’s part of what we can’t figure out from before he turned eighteen, and he’s had minimal contact with them since then, is what I gathered.”

Hughes nodded. “Find out more,” he ordered.

“That’s the plan.”

Hughes turned around and went back to his office, leaving the agents alone again. Blake held up a twenty. “Twenty bucks says Caffrey’s the middle, he’s just a mom brother.”

”’Mom brother’?” Amari mouthed, her eyebrows knit together in confusion over the term.

Jones shook his head, his lips quirked. “Nah, man, Caffrey’s definitely the oldest. He as good as confirmed it when I said I expected it.”

Nichols grinned and raised his eyebrows. “He’s a conman, how do you know he wasn’t just conning you?”

Paterson snorted. “Why con someone over that? To seem all high and mighty? Nah, he’s definitely oldest, I can tell.”

Blake shrugged. “I ain’t takin’ back my bet,” he drawled, leaning back against his chair lazily.

Diana smirked and leaned over. “Alright, I‘ll bite. And twenty five says another brother will come to the office within a month.”

Jones shook his head. “I’d say three weeks.”

Amari shook her head, the black fabric of her hijab swaying a little, “Ten says his dad is going to visit the office within the next two and a half months.”

Paterson gave her a look. “I think Caffrey will manage to hold him off for at least three.”

Amari stared at her, a perfectly manicured eyebrow raised in judgement. “You don’t even know who his father is, how would _you_ know if Caffrey could even manage to hold him off for a day?”

Paterson sputtered. “It’s an educated guess!”

Peter pinched the bridge of his nose. “Alright, get back to work everybody, this isn’t a gossip office.”

Jones laughed. “It’s not supposed to be, at least.”

Peter shot him a look of betrayal before throwing his hands up and walking back up to his office, content to ignore everyone for the rest of the day. Of course, this was just the beginning; the gossip and rumors only grew from there.

——

“Wait, what if his dad doesn’t visit the office at all?”

“Then the bet is void, duh.”

“Ah, of course.”

——

The explosion of what was already a gigantic amount of rumors that were mostly guesswork happened because of one discovery. It was an innocent one, but still a discovery. What was this discovery, you ask? Well, it was the discovery that the Jason who had visited Neal in the office was the very same Jason Todd who had been killed in an accident a year before. No one stumbled across who Jason Todd’s father was, and no one seemed to give it much mind in wake of this new discovery (which was kind of odd considering the fact that Bruce Wayne and his dead ward should have been headline, or at least mentioned in their research, but oh well).

With the discovery of the fact that Jason had faked his death (they refused to believe he had actually been dead for more than what was possible to be resuscitated from), the rumors and bets took a new turn. Some thought Neal and his family were involved in some shady mob business and Jason had faked his death to join the other side, but had had a change of heart which led to his visit to the white collar office. Others thought he had faked his death to protect his family, and was only in the clear to reveal himself a year later.

The prevalent theory was that Jason had faked his death to run away from his family and become a mercenary. It was kind of odd that this was the prevalent theory considering how outlandish most of the office workers found it, but it did seem to make an odd amount of sense. He just gave off that kind of vibe, y’know? Maybe he wasn’t the typical mercenary, maybe he was one of the ones you heard of that were hired to kill pedophiles or abusers or something; he seemed like he could be that kind of person.

——

Of course, these rumors were kept away from Neal’s ears (or so they thought, but of course Mozzie heard it, which means Neal heard it. He and the rest of the family had shared a few laughs over some of the more outlandish ideas that haven’t been mentioned).

Several agents did approach Neal to ask about his brother, never blatantly mentioning the rumors, but somewhat implying them. Often times, they left the conversation with more questions than they had in the beginning, but didn’t realize they had more questions until the conversation was over and done with and Caffrey was nowhere to be found.

——

Three weeks later, Jones collected twenty five dollars from Diana with a smirk. A week and two months after that (three months from the original incident), Paterson smugly collected ten dollars from Amari with a playful smirk, turning around before being able to see the blush on her cheeks.

**Author's Note:**

> What’d ya think. I thrive off of comments and support they give me life I swear. Also, did you find it funny? I think I have an issue with making my stories funny, but I also don’t think I’m in a place to judge because the author will almost always think they can make it better. Did you laugh at least once? Or chuckle, I’ll take a chuckle.  
> Also, please comment, it gives us the motivation to continue. It doesn’t have to be long paragraphs (writing those for this series is my job lol), I’ll take a single word (“Good!” “Bad”—please explain why in that case, I need to know things—“Amazing!”). Just taking a few seconds to give me some feedback is a huge help, not just to me but to other authors as well, so think about it??  
> Also, in other news, for those of y’all in the VLD fandom, what would you think about a dragon/fantasy au fanfic? Keith would be the dragon, of course. I wouldn’t post it ‘til after this series, most likely, and I need to iron out some kinks, but yay or nay?


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